Peter Speaks

This is the text of an email I received from Colin Wright, who speaks with Peter occassionally. I sent him a few questions to put to Peter, and here's his answer.
I was able to chat with Peter for a briefly today and put some of your questions to him.

Firstly, does Peter think this will be the last tour because of
Steve's hearing ? Or will they record and tour regularly until
they're frail toothless old men :)

Peter really wants it known that he has not re-joined The Church. He sees the current work as a collaboration and that his 'role' on the up-coming tour is that of 'special guest'.

Apparently, Steve has a bad case of tinnitus, an occupational hazard of all of us that work in the music industry and Tim Powls is in a similar position. I would say though, that it's not necessarily a permanent condition and often does heal with passage of time.

David Troen-Krasnow, a member of the Seance list says that he has read up on this and its usually permanent. The nerves don't regenerate, except those located in the nose....now there's a thought !

How does he pass his time from day to day ? Writing &
recording ? Bumming around ? Writing his life story ?

Peter works part time for the inner city, free community newspaper, 'The City Hub'. He also does a lot of music tuition and is currently working for 'The Bondi Wave', a youth community music program, close to his home. The rest of the time, yeah, he's writing, recording, bunmming around!!

I asked about Ploog too. He's working in the catering department of a Sydney hospital and playing in a reggae band. He's also working with Peter in a new outfit. No band name as yet - I'll let you know. I'll also try to get some time out of the studio to see Ploog's reggae band and maybe have a chat with him. I havn't seen Ploog for yonks!!

Does he still look at the Shadow Cabinet web site ? Would he
like to add anything to it...

In an office next to the studio is an internet service provider so in
response to the last question, Peter and I lobbed in there and, thanks to James Robinson at 'Zed Connect' (check'm out at http://www.zed.com.au/), we pulled up 'Shadow Cabinet' there and then. Peter says that he doesn't often get onto the web and the last time that he looked at "Shadow Cabinet" was very early in the year. He was amazed at what he saw. I think that he was expecting a page or two and was a bit overwhelmed, but equally impressed, by the
depth and amount of information therein. His words were,"Shit, these people know about stuff before I do!" or words to that effect. I've arranged for him to come over to my place sometime in the near future so that he can browse with a bit more leisure.

He did say that were was a fair bit of mythology about the band that he wouldn't mind putting straight, but he also said that he was very grateful to those people on the mailing list that sent in their comments about his album (Water Rites)which he used as part of his publicity. He also mentioned that the band wouldn't want it known if they were looking at the site regularly because he valued the honesty and openness of the fans of The Church and didn't want people to tone down what they might want to say.

(We've chatted about this on Seance and we all resolutely vowed not to pull any punches if we knew they were there. They could join under pseudonyms if they wanted too.)

He doesn't know if he wants to add anything to the website until he's had a more in-depth look. I'll keep you posted on that one.

Peter was very relaxed and open and quite generous and happy to talk. He was saying to me that he reckons that The Church are one of Australia's most important bands of all time and I must agree with him. Sure INXS and Kylie Minogue have sold lots of commercial albums, but in terms of far reaching influence, especially in many new and young bands,
The Church and Nick Cave are far more important. He says he's particulaly excited by the young people that are getting into the band.

Hopefully, I'll be able to give you some warning of when he'll be over to look at the website and I'll try to get him to answer some more of your questions himself through my e-mail.

In the meantime, I hope that the above will keep you going. I'll try to get a bit of time with John sometime soon to talk about his new album. I'll let you know on that one too so that I can ask him any questions on your behalf. If anyone on the list wants to e-mail me direct please do.